soon to be plus 2 owner...I think! hood stuck!

[rgh0]

Dave

A lot of oil in the water I think. Sounds like time for a major engine rebuild unfortunately.

The spin on canister type filter requires a new pump at about $100 which is small change when you rebuild the engine.

Rohan

[types26/36]

Sounds to me like the previous owner had overheating/head gasket problems (took out the thermostat) and probably added some sort of rad/gasket sealer, maybe it never mixed or the water evaporated/leaked and left all the gunge in there,I think you are in for a head job at least but pull the head and then decide whether it needs further work.Think it would be advisable to do a waterpump overhaul while you have the head off.
Brian

[thor]

I would also agree with the last post. This happened to me last year (on my Triumph).
I also rinsed and re-filled with water. On the next start up of the engine it came in synchrony with white smoke from the exhaust as soon as I put the rad cap on. Blown head gasket....

Thor

[dafrogtoad]

well...
Not good, but hey, who thought it would be perfect? The rad is pluged up w/this crud as well, and I'll HAVE to deal with that anyway. Soooo, I guess I'll just get that done, fire it up and see if any white smoke shows up. It ran 2 days ago, poorly, but it ran. I didn't find any sign of any water in the oil, (should I have? I thought it should) and we'll just see. I was hoping that the PO just had a rad leak and put a LOT of junk in it trying to seal it. I flushed the engine (running) to not only verify that the water pump was working, but to see if any OTHER crud would come out. It pumped just fine. I used a 55 gal drum with a hose running to the pump inlet, bypassed the heater core, and ran another hose from the thermo outlet out on the ground, seemed to pump fine, and was very clean..(hopeful thinking perhaps?) I already told myself if I have to do much of anything to the engine, I'm going to rebuild it. Just have to find someone I trust to do the work. Engine rebuilding is out of my league, especially THIS one.

Dave
Wondering what I got myself into!!

[M100]

I've had an engine on another car (non Lotus) that was running ok if a little hot for many months that had the electric fan sieze. The result was the coolant boiled and dislodged sediment that had been laying dormant in the block for years dumping huge clumps of black silty gunge in the header tank. When I flushed the block, rad and heater out I could barely believe how much muck had been in there. Probably half the coolant volume was being displaced by the silt. No idea where it came from!

[dafrogtoad]

Amazing. I have never seen that. I'm going to take the rad to our local shop, and see what they say. I'll post in later.

[Hamish Coutts]

Dave,

Tell your radiator shop the new core for a Triumph 2.5 PI will fit. It has more cooling tubes in it because they are closer together. Got mine done in the UK for ?90. A lot cheaper than buying a replacement rad.

Best of luck,

Hamish.

[dafrogtoad]

Howdy, quick update.
Rad done, re-rod, clean prime 70 bucks US. I was told that the stuff in the rad. was nothing more than the leftovers from the collant that evaporated over the 20+ years the car sat. We'll see.
Painted the rad. mounts. air cleaner.
Going to read up on the headlight system, as we can get to it just now.
Found that the vacuum "T" to the chassis is toast. BIG vacuum leak there! Going to plug it off for now.
So, anythink I might need to know about the ehadlight system? Anything that the gurus of Lotus have learned that might NOT be in the book?

Thnaks Ya'll

Dave

[twincamman]

with apology's to the purists----G.M. electric motors found on all cars with movable covers or pop up headlights----available at your friendly wrecking yard-----don't have your fingers in the region as they will close with authority-----ed

[dafrogtoad]

Hmmm, never had a GM product w/ opening headlights..How would THAT work?
What I have here SEEMS to be in ok condition (visually) The only thing I KNOW is bad is the "T" that has some sort of check valve in it, That is gone (broken and really gone) I'll be calling R & D to see if I can get one. If I can I'll then do the checks I read at gglotus.org. I just want to know if there's any weird things about this that might not be covered in books.
As far as work today, I'm in the process of cleaning the nose area. Pretty dirty. The rad. is sitting with wet paint, and we're just trying to deal with all the issues in the nose while we have it apart. (air cleaner, headlights etc.)

Thanks again

Dave

[twincamman]

how wold that work? well the motor revolves and turns a bell crank attached to the light pod-that pulls the pod up and or down as required ---no worries about vacuum leaks --or sudden night blindness on dark nights---ed

[M100]

>with apology's to the purists----G.M. electric motors found on all cars with movable covers or pop up headlights

They are used by Lotus on the Esprit and 90's Elan (also the 70's Elite/Eclat) and certainly on later (mid 80's onwards) they were lifted straight from the GM parts bin.

Corvettes, Firebirds and Fieros are similar/the same as Lotus use. There are a series of photos either on here or on the Yahoo mailing list of an installation someone has done on an Elan.

[dafrogtoad]

I'm just now waiting for some parts to be delivered. I hope to use all original parts is possible. But, if not, where ARE the pics/info on the electric conversion? Can someone provide me with a link?

Thanks

[dafrogtoad]

Hello list,
Well, it's been a pretty good week. We got the carbs rebuilt, the rad. rodded, the dizzy straightened out ( we think) new points, cond. plugs wires, and cap. We changed the oil/filter and cleaned out the fuel lines along with the pump/filter.
We aslo let the engine sit w/Marvel Mystery oil in each cylinder to hopefully stop her from smoking a bit (as she was).
She started (with the help of starter fluid) and runs pretty rough. I'm getting surges (real bad) and it will not idle at all until warm, then not well and too high (1500)
She does not smoke due to oil anymore, but does give off "rich running" smoke when you gas it.
Ideas? Not much on the strombergs to adjust....

[Hamish Coutts]

On the strombergs I had years ago, there was a large brass nut under the carb that you use to adjust the mixture. Strombergs are different to webbers/Dellortos in that you can actually adjust the mixture. The procedure is fairly simple to do if you follow the rules.
Best thing is to get a book on the carbs, that can save you hours of learning by doing and give you lots of really good advice.

A search on Google should show up what you want.

Regards,

Hamish.